The present invention relates to an identification inverter which will receive a card, and rotate the card about an axis lying transversely to the card and coincident with the bisecting plane of the card so that when rotated to any angular position including inversion, the plane of the card stays on the axis of rotation.
Various card "flippers" or inverters have been advanced in the art, where the plane of the card is offset from its original plane when it is inverted 180.degree.. U.S. Pat. No. 5,771,058 discloses a device that will turn a card about an axis on the central plane of the card, but it requires at least two sets of rollers and a belt drive for the rollers.
It has been found that it is desirable in many instances to print information on both sides of an identification (ID) card, and also to provide a protective laminate over printed material, photographs, holographs and the like on both sides of the ID card. In order to print and laminate both sides efficiently, the card is inverted and then moved in reverse, back through the printer head or laminating section and then forwardly so that a separate operation is performed, such as printing or adding a laminate layer on the second side of the card. When the card inverter or flipper offsets the plane of the card, special accommodations for handling the card for the operation on the second side have to be made. With the present invention, the card plane does not shift after a full 180.degree. inversion, so that the card can easily be fed back through a printer or laminating section for processing the second side.